


Fidget

by declarejenos



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Character Study, Enemies to Equals, Enemies to Friends, Graphic Depictions of Illness, Implied/Referenced Torture, It’s taken me a year to pluck up the courage to post this..., Kidnapping, M/M, Non-Consensual Mind Reading, Pre-Relationship, Prisoner Hux, Rescue, They’re Both Dicks, hurt!hux, post-TFA, prisoner!Hux
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-07
Updated: 2017-12-07
Packaged: 2019-02-11 15:08:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12937881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/declarejenos/pseuds/declarejenos
Summary: Having returned to the Finalizer post-Starkiller, Ren should be attempting to pursue his destiny by seeking out Luke Skywalker and The Girl. Instead he contemplates why he can't stop fidgeting...and what has become of the missing General...





	Fidget

**Author's Note:**

> My first ever fic. Please be kind! Looking for a beta reader if anyone is interested...?

It’s happening again. He’s just caught himself in the act whilst striding along the corridor, side by side with his new co-commander, a sea of underlings in their wake. The long lost habit, from his earliest days on the Finalizer, appears to be sneaking back into his life. He’s been fidgeting with his glove. The right thumb flicks out from under his loosely closed fingers, eliciting a faint wispy sound as the leather rubs. With a grimace (thankfully concealed by his helmet) he ceases the movement. His mind and body, so recently focused by Snoke's torturous attentions, was no longer supposed to require such physical distractions. Returning to the present, he takes in the clean lines and blinking lights of the passing consoles and control systems as they continue down the endless corridors. The Finalizer's current state is a testament to his efforts; he has destroyed neither equipment nor injured personnel since his return. This minor physical slip irks him. He tries to shift his attention back to the droning engineer once more, explaining the ins and outs of the long list of repairs and upgrades required after the shock-wave. The shock-wave from the explosion of the planet. The planet he had been rescued from... by someone he wasn't supposed to recall. _Stop. Concentrate._

Whilst the Fleet had regrouped and begun its attacks on the weakened New Republic, Kylo had spent the past weeks 'completing his training' with Snoke. He had endured a series of agonising mental and physical trials, his dark side fuelled by the fresh shame of his defeat on Starkiller, the ongoing pain of his healing battle wounds and those who had betrayed the First Order... One particular betrayal had burned brighter than any other and in his initial meditations he had searched the galaxy for former First Order General Armitage Hux, but he had found no trace. Hux was either dead or somehow hidden from him. As the man was far too annoying -not to mention organised- to have simply died, defection was the obvious conclusion. Once the initial violent physical and emotional outbursts this realisation evoked had passed, Snoke had ordered him to cast aside these petty concerns and concentrate. He must feed upon the anger of his defeat by the girl and glory in the imminent defeat of the Resistance in the wake of the destruction of the Hosnian system. It was time for their sun to rise. His hatred for one man should not eclipse his lust for power.

He let out an inaudible sigh as the command group began their return to the bridge. Satisfied there was nothing to attend to (and that the tour had been, as expected, a complete waste of his time), he nodded in the direction of the new General and silently took his leave. He had not spoken more than a handful of words since his return and had left the business of the war to the new head of the First Order, concentrating instead on searching for the presence of Skywalker and The Girl. Making his way back to his quarters, hands in tight fists to resist the unconscious urge to move his thumb, he goads himself with shame in preparation for his next task. The more he touches people's minds, the stronger the bonds that form and his intense interrogation of the inexperienced girl before her escape should have allowed him to find her again with ease. Skywalker must be protecting and schooling her mind for it to have gone undetected and it stood to reason that the more time that passed the smaller his chances of finding her became. He needed to redouble his efforts. He should have spent less of his initial time searching for Hux... _Stop thinking about him._

He enters his quarters and heads straight for the window, releasing his helmet and letting it carelessly thud to the floor on his way, not bothering with the lights or climate controls. He briefly looks out into space, watching the tie fighters zipping past in tight formations and supply vessels making their way to and from the planet they’re orbiting, before focusing much further away. The twinkling stars, any or none of which might harbour his prize, stretch out endlessly into oblivion before him. Suddenly frustrated, he summons his saber and ignites it, casting an eerie red glow over the room and reflecting his image in the transparisteel. The scar on his face is clearly visible and the anger it elicits is instant. He screams, casting the weapon away, and throws himself to the floor. Pressing his head and palms against the glass, he closes his eyes and lets his mind expand outwards, quickly taking in the ship around him and its many minds. Post-Starkiller (which had taken many of the Order's best and brightest) there are far fewer familiar ones. The strongest presence on board is the person he has known the longest: Phasma. The expert survivalist was somewhere in the bowels of the ship, probably running new training simulations if the physical buffeting and profanities she was currently uttering were anything to go by. A few others catch his attention, including Lieutenant Mitaka's depressed presence, sleeping fitfully, immersed in another Starkiller nightmare. Disinterested, he skims past them all to the vibrating hull before throwing his mind out into the void, a spiderweb of mental threads stretching out into the nothingness.

After what feels like an eternity, he senses an unexpected tug on his mental line and tries to school his excitement and concentrate as he races towards it along the tenuous strand. With the exception of the occasional gentle pulse of Leia Organa (which he's learnt to ignore), he's not felt anything unusual out there for a long time. He breaks through the surface of the mind eagerly, in a rush to invade, rage and pillage everything in reach...but pulls out sharply as his senses are assaulted. With a sharp intake of breath through his teeth his hands fly to his head, both from the pain at the too sudden withdrawal and in frustration at what he knows he's just felt. He opens his eyes as his consciousness swims back into the room and he flops backwards to lie down, panting on the floor of his quarters. That was NOT what he had expected to find.

Despite lying in safety on the quiet ship, he shudders from the sensations which linger. Kylo can still hear the ringing in his ears from someone shouting into them extremely loudly at close quarters, the ache of something sharp having been inserted under a fingernail, stiff dried blood caking his face, the stinging broken lip which has recently taken a blow and, worst of all, the stench of burning flesh. He knows who that was, being interrogated. He's skimmed that mind hundreds of times, knows it's all-consuming desire for power and control, eschewing the comforts and pleasures most humans required, as a sacrifice on the alter of ambition. There was no fear in that mind, only pain and determination to remain silent. He takes a deep breath in and out through his nose to calm himself. Despite all their petty rivalries and mutual dislike of one another, he had grudgingly respected the rigid discipline and loyalty of the man, until he had uncharacteristically fled. He suddenly realises he's flicking his thumb again and rises from the window, stalking to the fresher to splash his face with water and cleanse himself of the experience. He must never follow that thread or seek that consciousness again. Hux is no longer any of his concern. Even if he does talk, he’s been gone too long to compromise the Order. He can burn in hell where he belongs. _The Girl_ , he thinks. _I need to find The Girl._

*

He's sat in front of the window once again, scowling at his hands. The return of his fidgeting, a leftover tic from the time before his mask, is an unwelcome reminder of his past. In one of their earliest meetings, the much younger but no less unpleasant Armitage Hux had poured scorn on him for being unable to school his features. After that, Kylo had somewhat successfully attempted to divert his emotions away from his face by concentrating them elsewhere. The habit was born out of necessity. The distraction had served him well until his control improved (or he received his first helmet... looking back now, he's unsure which of these eliminated it) and then the habit had been cast aside. He grunted. His subconscious appeared to be bodily flicking his thoughts back to the forbidden subject again and again. He clenched his fists and prepared to seek out that mind again. Weakness. No, he tells himself, no, it's not weakness. He must satisfy his curiosity as to why the man ran, see how much he's divulged and then finally take his revenge on behalf of the First Order. Snoke will approve once he understands Kylo's aim. To sate his bloodlust and take satisfaction in his enemy's destruction will focus him for his continuing task. Plus it might stop his hand from twitching. That's what he tells himself anyway.

When he connects, Hux is just barely asleep, face down on the floor, too exhausted to move from where they dropped him after his last session. Kylo breathes the scenario deep into himself, trying to take stock of the situation. He smells dust, blood and filth through the link, making his own nose and lip wrinkle in disgust. He can feel the constant small pinpricks of pain from physical and mental wounds, that are robbing the prisoner of the most healing layers of deep sleep. There is also a restlessness, that of a brilliant mind atrophying on the floor of a cell designed to deprive the senses, turning over and over, underpinned by the slightly unsteady heartbeat resulting from regular bloodloss and dehydration. There's a thin aperture leading into Hux’s currently dark consciousness and Kylo squirms through it, in search of answers. The usually rigid mind within is fractured and he scrabbles for purchase in the rubble, but there's nothing solid to grasp. And what there is appears to be some sort of front. The jagged edges of useless ditritus flit past him: fragments of memories of outdated command codes, long decommissioned starship blueprints, antiquated door lock sequences and long dead officers from the previous war.

Suddenly, something physically strikes him. A hard boot in the ribs jars Kyo into another quick withdrawal. They cry out together across the galaxy as their minds separate, one from the pain of the sudden mental separation, the other from the impact to his already broken ribs. But the exploration wasn't a loss. In that split second of consciousness, as Hux's splintered thoughts were vaguely pushed back into some semblance of order, a single explanatory word had jumped out and hit Kylo: 'kidnappers'. _Shit_.

Ren thinks back on what he knows. It's all very straightforward. After delivering a barely conscious Kylo Ren to the Supreme Leader, the General had been ordered to return to the Finalizer and 'await further instructions' (read: probable demotion, ignominy, punishment). His ship entered hyperspace but never arrived at its destination. It was found abandoned and stripped of it's electricals on the edge of Hutt Space shortly thereafter. The dead personnel within, all accounted for except Hux, had been executed at close quarters, as if taken unawares by someone they trusted. Hux's quarters, comm, files and log entires yielded no clues. Not even Kylo's personal presence could draw any further information from the Finalizer's elite slicers, who had been made to tirelessly scour the internal and holonet databases for days without rest, in the knowledge that their lives depended on obtaining results. Phasma’s interrogations of the command structure, Starkiller escapees and Finalizer crew were extremely thorough. The warrior woman herself was off the hook as she had not returned to the ship until after Ren had begun his journey to Snoke and a full survey of her mind revealed nothing pertinent. A particularly thorough sweep of the mind of Hux's favourite, Mitaka, revealed a lot of emotional trauma but that he had also reached the same dead ends as Ren in the search for his General.

However, he did see something in Mitaka's mind which piqued his interest. The memory snippet and the sensations it evoked were the result of a rare genuine smile for the lieutenant, when Hux had called him into his office and given him his bridge promotion in person. Ren wouldn't have noticed this seemingly trivial memory if it hadn't meant so much to Mitaka. A treasured memory of someone he respected congratulating him with a rare facial expression. And that was the itch that kept Ren scratching. Every mind he touched returned the same results. Under the fear, jealousy, paranoia and myriad of other negative emotions the man typically inspired from those beneath him, there was always an underlying loyalty and respect, not always offered up grudgingly. The General's heart beat only for the Order and it’s glory. It was not a good or whole heart, but it was pure, and Ren wondered if that was something perhaps valuable enough to attempt to save.

*

The third time he searches the void he has a gut feeling that time is running out...and he saw someone's eyes flick to his glove on the bridge. When he connects, Hux is alone and awake in his cell, chained upright to the wall but slumped from exhaustion against his painful bonds. He’s trying to keep his mind active and distract himself from his bodily pains by running training exercises in his head; risk assessments, budgeting, choosing personnel etc. An ordered and neat fantasy of what he’ll go back to when he escapes or is liberated. Kylo has interrupted it with his presence, the concentration is disrupted, and the thoughts distort like ripples on water. Unlike before, Hux feels him this time, heart starting to thud faster with the realisation that there is something there, inside his mind, in his body. At this distance the bond won't allow for communication, but Kylo holds the connection steady, hoping the prisoner will come to terms with the presence and eventually understand it. What happens instead is a slow slide into mental crisis as real fear starts to take hold for the first time since Hux’s captivity. He thinks he's going insane. That he's finally lost it from the constant torture and deprivation. There's a stab of bitterness, quickly subdued -it doesn't matter anymore, they've told him he's slated to die anyway. Despite his attempt at self-control, a landslide of dangerous emotions begins; the shame of his capture, the futility of his painful silence, and worst of all, anguish that he's going to perish alone, in pain, forgotten by the organisation he had always been willing to sacrifice his life for. Until now, he thought it would be worth it. He's not feeling so sure anymore...

Kylo knows what he must do. He takes a deep breath and drives inwards, ripping his way through Hux’s most recent memories in search of answers. What he finds near the surface is mostly suffering and torture, which make him twist and hiss as he experiences microsecond bursts of days worth of agony. He takes every memory of the ordeal he can find, working his way backwards in time, as fast as he can and its gruelling for both of them. He gradually feels the pressure from the assault building in the mind he's rifling through and his beartbeat is pounding in his ears. The pressure closes around his skull and he absently realises both their noses have begun bleeding from the effort; the blood is trickling down his chin and dripping onto his clasped hands. When the buildup of energy in his skull becomes too much to bear, Hux lets out a feral scream, sweat and blood beginning to rain down onto the cell floor from his wildly twisting, cramping body, and the memories which Kylo is mercilessly plundering begin to slowly fracture. He realises what's happening to Hux, how far he's gone, and withdraws as gently as he can, praying the man is just losing consciousness. "Shit" he curses aloud, blinking his eyes open to gaze once again through the transparisteel, out into the void beyond. He dares not go back in again, fearing he's already destroyed something precious. But it was the only way. He thinks he has what he needs. He wipes the blood on his robes as he stands and staggers out the door at a run.

*

Kylo gut feeling was correct. He arrives just in time. The initial alarms caused by his arrival have been silenced (by him) but the red alert beacons are still flashing. The blindfolded and bound prisoner is being half carried half dragged from his cell. Kylo blocks the way as they round the corner of the corridor leading to the control room (now full of the dead and dying) and the hanger (also full of the dead and dying). At the sight of him, spattered in gore, lowered saber fizzing with evaporating drips from his blood soaked arms, they stop abruptly, too shocked to do anything but let go of their charge. After a shocked pause, they shove Hux forward towards him, causing the prisoner to stumble and fall to his knees and Kylo hurriedly flicks his saber off to avoid slicing up the falling captive, so close does he land at his feet. The captors have retreat at a run back the way they came. Ren makes a mental note to make sure to kill them along with any others that have escaped. He's sealed all the exits so there's ultimately nowhere for them to go. He turns his attention to the prisoner, who after a brief but futile attempt to rise, has let his head fall so low it's almost resting against the floor by Kylo’s boot. His battered body is almost naked and the red light falling onto his bare skin briefly causes Kylo's mind to recall a similar image. His co-commander during the early Starkiller tests, the light from the crystals illuminating his pale complexion. The Knight of Ren had stood unseen in the shadows, experiencing visions of billions of lives being exstinguished as the light of the red beam was reflected on Hux’s face. He pulls himself back to the present and looks at Hux properly. He's in a bad way and despite the help of the guards, the physical effort required of him to get from his cell to here has left him breathless and sweating on the floor. Kylo also notes that the General’s usually carefully styled hair has grown longer in captivity and, left to its own devices, has fallen down over his face, hiding his expression. Wishing to get a read on him before he says or does anything else, Kylo attempts a quick swipe at Hux’s mind. He reals from the instant assault of adrenaline-induced nausea directly at the front of Hux’s mind and he pulls back immediately, swaying as he recovers from the onslaught.

Quiet has quickly descended and Hux senses the change in atmosphere. He brings his head up with a grunt, blindfolded face seeking vaguely in Kylo's direction. Hux’s lips part with a particularly loud exhale and the Knight realises this is going to be an attempt to speak. At first, the only sound is a shakey ffffffff pushed out from between swollen lips. It's almost too much effort. The makes one final push, breathing in and tensing his muscles as if he's about to jump. "Fff...fffuck you!" he manages to shout huskily, pushing the air through his swollen vocal chords. Bracing himself, Kylo makes another sweep of the prisoner's mind, revealing defiance that he gave them nothing with a faint underscore of acceptance that he's done his duty. Kylo is momentarily frozen in shock, looking down at the vulnerable mess kneeling at his feet. Hux thinks he's going to die. Right now. Those were his last words.

Kylo’s face beneath the mask breaks out in a feral grin. He indulges in a quick fantasy about how he's going to laud this over the man forever, and wonders whether he should have brought a support team to film the rescue for the archives. Armitage Hux's life is entirely in his hands and he’s going to be magnanimous. He opens his mouth to voice an off-the-cuff quip in honour of the General's rather coarse last words...

"Ren, stop fidgeting and untie me."

  
*

Typical Hux, ruining his moment. Kylo is so shocked and exasperated by the General's attempt at an order he isn't able to respond immediately. Conversely, Kylo's appearance has given Hux a new lease of strength, a lightness born of hope. He cocks his head, struggling slightly against his restraints. "Well?" He manages, sharply, between slightly wheezy breaths, "what are you...waiting for?", a questioning frown causing the blindfold to pull around his eyes. Kylo is still too stunned to move. The razor-like mind below him is gradually sharpening back into focus and Kylo reflexively skims it in preparation to either speak or move. A new ripple of thought causes Hux's face to start to fall. _Oh_ , he thinks. _Maybe he's not here to save me. Maybe he's here to kill me?_

Kylo is stunned once again into inaction, his face twisted in sick fascination under his helmet, wondering where this train of thought will lead. Hux takes the fullest breath he's managed since Kylo arrives, almost a sigh, and bows his head with a grimace. "Get it over with" he bites out tightly.

That finally spurs Kylo into action. He laughs. A low pitched but bright chuckle through the vocoder, the sound of which causes the smaller man to sag further, defeated. He reflexively flinches at the swish of fabric and cream of armour when Kylo finally moves, but it’s no defence against the gloved hand that reaches down and snuffs out his meagre consciousness in an instant. Kylo doesn't want to deal with this anymore. Its not gone as he expected. Plus, judging by his inability to walk on his own, their exit is likely going to cause Hux's already damaged body even more pain, which will no doubt lead to an equally or greater amount of complaining. Kylo hates listening to Hux complain. He clicks off the prisoner’s restraints with the force and in one swift movement he has the slight body over his back. Despite his near equal height, Hux has always been considerably smaller and there appears to be even less of him than he expected. Is it the result of his captivity or does the General's uniform have more padding than even Kylo could have imagined? Until now he’d never seen him out of uniform so will probably never know. He allows himself a grim little smile at how he will use all this excellent material in the future and shrugs Hux's bony carcass into a better position (leaving his sabre arm free) and sets off.

*

Satisfied with his final sweep and that there are no surviors, Kylo uses the force to hit the ramp closure override on his Upsilon shuttle. He’d breifly returned earlier to shrug off the still-unconscious Hux along with his outer robe, forming an unceremonious pile in the corner of the main bay, before heading back out to finish the job. He checks it’s still there (and Hux is still breathing) before making his way to the cockpit. They're not in a hurry but the sooner they leave, the sooner Hux'll have access to a medical team. There’s no-one with the skills he needs on board. This class of ship would normally have a crew of three but with an astromech droid and an expert pilot, especially one with the force, there's no need and the thing practically flies itself anyway. Plus Kylo hates other people. Removing his gloves and helmet, he sets up the autopilot to break atmo, and with more instinct than skill, plots the coordinates for the jump to hyperspace. "Start her up and pre-flight checks. Go only on my mark" he instructs the astromech and heads back to the main bay, hearing the ticks and blips of the cockpit booting up and the engines rumble to life as he goes.

Hux is exactly where he left him, although Kylo notes there are now what looks like a mix of bodily fluids on the floor. Fuck. He really doesn't want to do this. He's not a medic and he resents the idea of doing anything to benefit or aid his rival. But... But, when Hux had rescued Kylo from the planet, a debt had started to mount between them. Kylo has no doubts the General left the bulk of the work to the others on board the escape shuttle, but he has a hazy memory of an almost manic, sleep deprived Hux, hair dishevelled and clothing stained and rumpled from the undignified escape, muttering to himself whilst applying yet another stinging layer of bacta to the wound on Kylo's face. When he was finally delivered to the Supreme Leader, gift-wrapped in bandages, he was well on the road to recovery. With a put-upon sigh Kylo sets to work, aiming to get this unpleasant task over with as quickly as possible.

With a little more care than before and avoiding treading in the mess, Kylo scoops up the General and carries him to the ‘bedroom’. When he'd been given the brand new shuttle, he hadn't changed the layout a great deal. His only indulgance was to knock through the walls of the starboard storage rooms to make a decently sized sleeping quarters and fresher. It had felt like an extravagance at the time and he remembers Hux rolling his eyes at the change in the schematics. Kylo smirks. It's amusingly appropriate that Hux's eyes are currently rolled back in his head once more, about to take advantage of that very luxury.

The bed is stripped down to the wipe-clean base, accompanied by a complete field med kit with extra bacta. The pack has much more equipment than a standard resupply but is what he always finds here on the shuttle, as if they expect that he’ll need it. He wonders if this is more of Hux’s meddling or whether medical are so terrified by the sight of him they will do anything to avoid his appearance. As Kylo puts Hux down their faces momentarily align and a flash of precognition shows him a vision of the broken mess in front of him as the General once more, bodily whole and silhouetted against a transparsteel viewport. He closes his eyes for a moment and opens them once again in the present. He can see the prone man’s chest rising and falling and an internal tension he didn't know he was harbouring until that moment relaxes minutely. He huffs out a breath and buckles Hux into the bed’s gravity straps before leaving again for the cockpit.

Settling back into the pilot's seat, he supervises the autopilot and jump, making minor unnecessary adjustments and fiddling with the controls to stop his hands moving without his permission, but once the stars begin streaking past he has no further excuses to delay. With a sigh he heads once more for the sleeping quarters.

Looking down at the unconscious man before him, the first thing he notices is that Hux is cold. Without the cover of Kylo’s cloak the hair all over his body has been forced to stand on end in a vain effort to preserve body heat, while he shivers violently against the straps. Kylo adjusts the thermostat of the room to a higher temperature (which begins to warm the room immediately), removes his gloves and rolls up his sleeves. He lets out a long whistling breath through his teeth as he surveys the prone form. Hux had taken a lot more damage than he’d initially assumed. Kylo hadn’t felt half of these wounds through the link. This isn’t the first time he’s tapped Hux’s mind and has failed to grasp the full story and he files this thought away for later analysis. There’ll be plenty of time for thinking on the way back to the Finalizer, once he’s patched up the mess in front of him.

He snaps on disposable gloves and gets to work, wiping off the blood and dirt as best he can, cleaning wounds, applying bacta and wrapping field dressings as he goes. There's a lot of swelling from dislocations and breaks, along with an almost endless litany of puncture wounds, burns, cuts and sores. Some of them are infected, still weeping blood, clear fluids or pus and the smell makes him gag more than once. Hux’s slim hands and feet, which have taken a lot of damage and he immerses in bags filled with bacta, taped above the wrists and ankles, which the unyielding restraints have left raw. He briefly casts his eyes down to between Hux's legs, still covered by the soiled underwear, and winces. Reassuringly, there appears to be a vague bulge within, so chances are he's mostly in one piece? Suddenly embarrassed by the idea of looking at Hux’s crotch, he snaps his head away to continue his analysis, leaving the area untouched. The back of Hux's body is as bad as the front and the handheld field scanner reveals additional nerve damage which lines up perfectly with the pattern of the electrical burns, along with injuries to several internal organs. Nothing is bad enough to need immediate emergency surgery though, for which he's grateful. The closest he's ever come to medical training is tending to his own wounds with assistance from a droid. He’d destroyed the unit reasonably recently, leaving it in a pile outside Hux’s office after discovering his co-commander had been using it as a spy. It’s data had been sliced from it upon Kylo’s return from a particularly gritty mission, and his ‘dirty laundry’ aired in front of Snoke by the ungrateful bastard now lying here below him. His face goes hot at the memory and he deliberately jerks the end of the strapping around Hux’s broken ribs in annoyance as he ties them tightly in place.

Having left the head for last, Kylo slits off the blindfold with the medkit scissors and slicks back the messy red hair that’s fallen over the eyes with a glob of bacta. The face is no better than the rest of him, with seemingly not an inch left unmarked. There’s a very short stubble on his chin but nowhere near as much facial hair as there should be after all this time. He grimly wonders if they’d shaved Hux to make him more identifiable for the images of his execution. The features are sunken from dehydration and weight loss, the cheekbones harsh and angular, skin waxy and even paler than usual. If it hadn’t been for the slightly laboured mouth-breathing, he’d think he was staring at the mask of a corpse. There’s nothing he can do about the mouth-breathing. Hux’s nose is broken and there’s little point in Kylo attempting to ineptly reset it, possibly doing even more damage to the delicate cartilage. He follows the line of the nose, past the cheekbones up to the eye sockets (again, not in the best shape). Both eyes are swollen shut and he forces them open by pressing his thumb and forefinger upwards against Hux’s eyelids, to apply bacta directly to the bloodshot orbs. Despite the absence of the spark of consciousness they seem to stare at him accusingly and he shudders in disgust, withdrawing his hand to allow the swollen lids to close once more of their own volition. He does what he can for the remainder of the facial injuries and applies a thick layer of bacta all over. He can't do anything to the dirty, blood-matted hair except apply even more bacta to the scalp. His hands get caught in the matted strands as he works in more of the gel -Hux’s hair really has got rather long. He snorts through his nose at the thought of his co-commander’s reaction to waking up with a shaved head...but a quick glance tells him the pack doesn't have a razor and there’s no way he’s using his own. With a last smile at the thought of his arch rival bald and furious, he flicks on the heart monitor and stabs him in the arm with the fluids line, standing back to survey his handywork. This'll be ok until they get back to the Finalizer. Hux’s body will survive the trip. _But what of the mind?_  He realises he's fidgeting again, the disposable gloves resisting before releasing with a soft snap at the movement. _This isn't your problem. The debt is now repaid._ Sick of the sight and smell, he turns quickly, striding back to the cockpit without a second glance.

*

Hux is pulled back to painful consciousness by the urge to piss. A very strong urge. One of his eyes obeys his command to open (only a crack), blinking tears in response to the sting of bacta. As the eye adjusts to the dim light and gains some modicum of focus, he hazily identifies the ceiling as that of a First Order vessel, judging by the panelling. Sharp, clean design. His design. He can feel the hum of the engine but can’t hear a lot; one of his eardrums was perforated during his incarceration and is entirely deaf and the other is muffled by being covered by some sort of fabric. His impatient bladder sends another stab of pain down his groin and with a groan, he attempts but fails to curl into a ball, accidentally pulling at the cannula in his arm in the process, causing him to hiss at the sting. He’s under a thin sheet and bats it off, discovering that beneath it, his hands and feet are bagged and immersed in bacta, rendering them almost entirely useless. Thankfully the drip line is generously long and once he half falls half slithers off the low bed, he manages an undignified crawl to the fresher, dragging the wheeled fluids stand behind him. He hisses in relief. There’s blood in his urine, but that’s to be expected. He knows, remembers, what taking a beating feels like, and this is it. Once his most pressing business is complete, albeit in a less than dignified fashion and with no small amount of pain, he collapses to lie panting on the fresher floor, recovering. He's not dead. He’s not restrained. Those are the positives.

He uses his teeth to rip off the first bacta bag from his right hand, the gel going everywhere, including into his mouth, stinging his lips and raw gums. He wretches as he spits it out, adding to the mess on the floor, and his coughs hurt his aching ribs, causing spasms of pain all over his weak body. He forces himself to relax his muscles and breath evenly and within a few minutes has himself back under control, albeit unable to do much more than lie there. As the worst of the pain recedes he starts by flexing his mostly mended fingers on his free hand before making a start on the bags on his other hand and his feet.

He’d noted with horrified fascination whilst pawing them down his legs to urinate, that he’s been left in his filthy regulation underwear, which he’d worn throughout his captivity. He can’t decide if whoever has brought him here intended it as a mercy or a punishment. With the exception of the dirty, bruised and abused (but thankfully seemingly still functional) flesh beneath the disgusting garment, the rest of his body has been crudely cleaned, tended and bandaged. The fluids and nutrition line has also done stirling work... but he wants it gone. Now his fingers are free and shaking less he gingerly slides out the needle. A bright spot of fresh blood appears and he wipes it on the edge of a bandage. He looks dispassionately at the small puncture wound as it wells up again, before his single open eye is drawn to a long thick burn nearby, now almost healed from the bacta, the scar beginning to disappear. He shivers and nearly wretches again as he gets a flash of the incident and quickly blocks out the memory, returning to the present by further inspecting his body. He removes all the bandages he can reach and looks over at the floor-to-ceiling mirror which makes up an entire wall of the fresher. He must have been out for quite a while as the worst of the injuries that broke the skin are merely shiny pink scars and most of the remaining bruising he can see is yellow and fading. Unfortunately, despite the attempted cleansing he has obviously undergone and the overwhelming disinfectant stench of bacta, his skin almost itches from how grimy he feels. The need to be clean is overwhelming and he crawls to the sonic, still too exhausted to stand. He smacks his hand up at the interface, praying whoever previously set it didn’t program anything too violent. Thankfully, it’s bearable and for the sake of being clean he’ll suffer through the prickling of his raw nerve endings. He leans back against the wall, too overcome by the sensation of the sonic to do anything but let his head loll from side to side in an attempt to get the worst out of his hair. When he can’t take anymore of the buffeting he allows his body to roll sideways and fall out of the unit onto the floor and drags the rest of himself fully out. He feels a little less exhausted, spirits lifted by the cleansing vibrations. He still hurts almost everywhere, but it’s more a series of dull aches than sharp pains and he definitely shouldn’t feel as good as he does.

Using the wall, he levers his body to a slightly stooped standing position on shaky legs. The discarded bandages and underwear are lying in the floor where he left them. He doesn’t want to put any of those things back on. The shuttle is almost tropically warm (which he vaguely appreciates) but his self-hatred makes his need to cover up a top priority. He remembers the last time he was stripped naked, in that cell. The guard had had a stick... _No. Stop thinking about that._

He takes a careful step, testing his weight, before beginning a slow limp back out of the fresher, for a more careful look around the quarters. Upon studying the unusual shape of the room, he recognises that this is the bedroom of Ren’s command shuttle. Ah. That explains a lot but leads to even more questions. He sways in place, mind whiring...but he’s still naked and that spurs him back into action. The discarded sheet is covered in bacta and the stench makes him gag. He leaves it where it has fallen on the floor. There’s a neatly folded pile by the bed and Hux makes his way to it, hopeful for a uniform or at least some clothes. Shaking out the top layer he realises it’s linen for the bed. Cursing, he wraps a fresh sheet around his waist for the time-being and shuffles to the storage units in the wall, continuing his search. After a rummage he finds what look like exercise clothes, neatly folded. They smell freshly laundered, like the linen. There are several standard issue officer’s training base layers and, further down the pile, various garments from several different First Order departments, including maintenance and technical. Everything looks slightly too big but will do in the short term. He briefly pauses to consider that he’s about to put on what are probably his most hated rival’s clothes but he really has no choice. Grimacing a little from both pain and annoyance as he pulls them on.

*

Ren is asleep in the cockpit. Typically annoying and as always, problematic. Looking at him through the open hatch door, Hux is unwilling to get any closer to the sleeping man. Snoke‘s apprentice is known for his impulsive behaviour, and could easily accidentally (or on purpose) crush Hux’s windpipe in clumsy alarm before being fully awake. He takes a further moment to assess. Kylo Ren is slumped, slightly misaligned, in the shuttle’s pilot’s chair, dressed in his usual getup (minus the outdoor layers, helmet, and cloak), his head cricked awkwardly against his shoulder. He looks surprisingly different when he’s sleeping, expression slackened into something approaching harmless, despite the scar from starkiller angrily bisecting his face. A flicker of annoyance passes over Hux’s broken features when he thinks about Starkiller. The immediate instruction he had received, to deliver Ren to the Supreme Leader, had grated on him. He had wanted the cretin to die for what he’d done there, and the temptation to abandon him to the destruction of the planet has been strong. Unfortunately or fortunately (he can’t make up his mid which), his sense of self preservation through obeisance to Snoke had won out. In his manic, sleep-deprived state in the aftermath of the disaster, in a command shuttle not dissimilar to this one, he had tried his best to restore Ren to something approaching a serviceable condition with the limited resources on offer. Ren’s face had seemed like a reflection of the man’s whole being, savagely torn open and raw. Later, Hux had come to the realisation that a part of himself had been similarly broken by what had felt like a defeat (despite the destruction of the Hosnian system) and unconsciously, fixing the stupid boy’s face had seemed like a symbol of possible redemption and renewal. He had set to the task of restoration with an almost religious fervour, mostly as a distraction from the chaos outside, which he could do little about, being separated from the scattered fleet by his order to deliver Ren. The scar is now minimal considering how much damage Ren took and Hux feels a little pride in how well it has sealed up. He realises suddenly that whether the man realises it or not, he’s just returned the favour. He wonders if Ren knows about what Hux did for him, or if he assumes the stormtroopers and medics did it all? Another thought occurs to him, making him flush with embarrassment; Ren must have seen him almost naked and tended to his injuries, eyes casting over his body... touching him. He cringes and his insides turn over uncomfortably with shame and disgust. The idea of Ren or anyone else touching him right now is abhorrent. The only physical contact they have previously had was when Ren had been unconscious in that shuttle after Starkiller and the last time someone touched him was in that cell... _Enough. Focus._

Forcing himself back to the present, he tries to take comfort from the fact that he had the force user at his mercy once and he could possibly take him down right now if he had a weapon.... but even if he wanted to, he can’t. He has a small shred of honour left. He’s not Phasma (although he sometimes wishes he could be more like her). Ren has, it seems, rescued him, saving his pathetic life. His mouth pulls down further into a sour expression in response to the thought.

There’s a table in the small meeting room behind the cockpit, where he’s stood. On the table there’s an empty cup, probably left there by Ren at some previous point, he assumes. Impulsively, with a violent action, Hux backhands the cup off the table in response to his annoyance at his previous train of thought and frustration that Ren is asleep. It bounces out of view with a series of loud clangs and he hears and sees his rival jolt awake. One big hand instantaneously moves to his belt, lightsaber igniting, whilst the other fist slams forward with that preternatural quickness gifted to him by the force. Hux realises instantly he’s acted rashly as he feels a foreign grip pressuring his body, clutching way too hard for his current injured state. He cries out in pain, unable to do more than spasm as he’s held in place by the force. Triggered by the violence of the phantom grasp and being unable to move, a floodgate of previously dammed emotions spills over from a dark space inside his mind. He panics as he’s consumed by a wave of memories of the torturous horror he so recently endured. Ren releases him almost instantly with a grunt, as if burned by Hux’s response. At the sudden loss of pressure, Hux’s legs crumple and he sinks towards the ground.

“Shit” Kylo mutters and rises, stalking quickly towards him, unthinking. The grip and fall should have immobilised Hux in his current condition, but wide eyed and full of adrenaline, instead, he tries to scoot backwards and away, making a mindless wailing sound as he retreats towards the nearest wall. Hux doesn’t feel like he felt the last time he thought he was going to die, when he was blindfolded, awaiting what he thought was his execution. He was still in control then. Now he feels wild, undone. He’s not going to die with any dignity here. A tiny rational part of him knows his reaction is somehow wrong, but he’s almost out of his mind with fear and can’t process it. Too much pain, too many memories, not enough control. He’s finished. This is the end.

Kylo winces from the second hand emotions and rolls his eyes, looming darkly over the quaking figure, once again wiping out Hux’s consciousness with a swipe of his hand.

*

That had gone spectacularly badly, as everything involving the General always seemed to. He had been planning to keep the man sedated for the whole journey, deliver him to the medics and pay his ‘debt’, exactly in kind. But he’d fallen asleep in the cockpit, exhausted from too many catnaps at the console, and had missed the last dose of sedatives. Another failure. _Stupid_.

Before the incident, he’d checked on Hux a few times over the long dull hours in hyperspace, mostly to reapply bacta, but once or twice, just to observe the sleeping man from the doorway. He’d stood and watched Hux’s bony chest rhythmically rising and falling, dwelling morbidly on memories of their bitter rivalry. There should be power to be gained from the satisfaction of seeing his enemy painfully laid low. However, when the worst of the wounds had closed and he didn’t need to apply quite as much bacta, he’d thrown a sheet over the injuries with a strange sense of relief. Seeing this man he thought he hated in a defenceless state was doing strange things to him.

Back in the present, he’s crouched over Hux, having grabbed him as he snuffed out his consciousness. He’d gently lowered him to the ground, ostensibly to make sure nothing important smacked against the floor, but also, he now realises, because he’d not been able to suppress his natural impulse to smooth at Hux’s mind, to make the pain and fear stop, as it leached through their connection into him. He feels embarrassed by this weakness, face turning red and ears burning. He’s suddenly aware of the pulse of Hux’s warm neck thrumming beneath his fingers and belatedly realises that he’s allowed his hands to linger. Almost caressing the soft curve of Hux’s neck. He pulls away from the bare skin beneath his fingers as if it’s burnt him.

He needs to put Hux back in the bedroom. His bedroom. He’s tired, aches everywhere from sleeping awkwardly in the cockpit and he can’t sleep flat on his back to soothe the aches because he has to give up his bed to this sorry lump of flesh. A curl of darkness begins to unfurl within him at the annoyance. His competitor lies defeated and broken before him -now is the time to destroy him. With a swell of energy from the dark side he inhales, as if to accompany a blow. He doesn’t strike and instead lets out air escape in a long sigh through his nose, putting his hand to the bridge of his nose and squeezing. The rational part of him still functioning for once. Killing Hux now would render this whole trip pointless and all his energies would be a wasted effort. He’s had enough of wasting energy. Also, a part of him doesn’t want to destroy what he’s so recently healed. Maybe this will change things between them, now they’re even? Maybe allow for a fragile peace? He breaths in and exhales once more, through his mouth this time, and reaches out to gather up the body of his fallen colleague. He’s gentle this time, to avoid reopening the wounds he’s so recently closed. The walk back to the bedroom is brief but he notes en route that Hux is now much warmer to the touch, his skin is very clean and he’s wearing Kylo’s clean clothes (which he, in turn, has stolen from various missions, corpses and illicit rendezvous over the years).

He lays the limp body back down on the stripped bed, more carefully than before, moving the wiry limbs into a neat alignment he thinks the General would approve of. His final act is to turn over the right hand, palm facing downwards to match the left, giving the wrist an impromptu reassuring squeeze as he puts it down. He sucks in air through his teeth with a hiss at the unexpected display of comradely he had not originally intended. His fingers had overlapped easily around the joint and he had felt the delicate bones and muscles of the hand and arm shift and flex just below the surface of the thin flesh under the gentle manipulation. It had been almost...tender... He rolls his eyes at himself. He should probably check Hux over to make sure nothing has reopened or needs tending, but he suddenly doesn’t want to touch him anymore. He has an uneasy feeling that something has changed and he’s already had more bodily contact with his co-commander than he should have. He puts the medpack back on the edge of the bed and his hands hover above the torso, loathe to begin.

After a quick visual inspection of the unclothed parts, he pinches the fabric of the bottom of Hux’s top between thumb and forefinger and pulls it up to peer underneath. Everything looks fine. Rolling the legs of the loose bottoms to above the knee shows nothing untoward and he puts them back down, briefly allowing himself to note the red hair on Hux’s thin legs with interest -he’d never really thought about whether the collar and cuffs matched.... speaking of which... there’s only one area left after that. Especially now that he notes the absence of the underwear from before, he doesn’t want to investigate below the low slung waist of the bottoms and the thought of it warms his face. He distracts himself by opening his other senses to the room. He notes that it stinks of bacta, but the smell isn’t coming from Hux. He looks over his shoulder towards the fresher. It’s open with the lights on full and he walks over, poking his head round the door, finding a colourful mess on the floor within. The remains of the bags he’d used to wrap Hux’s hands and feet lie in pieces. Their contents, plus the yellow fluid leaking from the abandoned drip are spread out over the floor and are now evaporating into the warm air with a sickly sweet odour. The sonic is also humming quietly, having been left on with a sticky layer of bacta slopped onto the controls. He flicks the machine off with the force to silence the hum, rescues the drip, and leaves the mess where it lies. Whoever cleans the shuttle when they get back can deal with it.

For the first time ever, he takes a moment to ponder this. When he returns to the Finaliser, the shuttle is normally covered in dirty boot prints, fragments of smashed consoles and the day to day detritus of his itinerant lifestyle. He’s used it to transport prisoners, for torture, to entertain... There have also been occasional corpses of enemies or storm troopers who’ve died on the way back from missions (either from their injuries or from inadvertently provoking his ire). He’s always just left everything where it falls and the next time he returns to the ship, it’s repaired without complaint, everything spotlessly clean, with every scratch polished out and every surface shining. Just like the Finaliser itself always is on his return. That, of course, is Hux’s doing. Everything running cleanly, like clockwork. Ordered body, ordered mind, ordered ship etc. Was the attention paid to his command shuttle Hux’s doing? Once again, his mind wanders back to the sleeping man. Will anything change upon their return? After taking this much physical and emotional damage, he doesn’t see how Hux could possibly be the same.

A sudden movement catches his attention as Hux twitches. Moving closer, Kylo sees that the sleeping man’s eyes are darting back and forth behind his closed lids. Alarmed that he might be reliving Kylo’s more recent trauma-inducing incident, he puts a hand to Hux’s forehead and probes the mind beneath. He lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding when he senses that this is purely a byproduct of the broken mind gradually knitting back together and Hux’s unconscious is blessedly blank. He once more puts a line in the arm, sticking in an additional dose of the sedative, which will probably now last until after they get back, and the twitching gradually dies down. A bit of hair has fallen over Hux’s face and he moves to sweep it back, freezing as he catches himself halfway through the overly intimate gesture. This might be the last time he ever sees this face when it isn’t twisted in anger or scorn (as it usually does when it looks upon him). Well, whilst Hux is alive, anyway. That’s suddenly not as attractive a thought as it has been previously. He completes the action anyway, smoothing the hair back, casting his eyes up and down the man’s supine form. When he’s not spitting with rage and screaming vitriol, the General could be seen to be almost attractive, he thinks. The body has the look of a dancer, the long muscles of the legs are wiry but firm, the arms thin but muscular, and the face angular but also soft, currently slightly flushed in sleep. His eyelashes are almost translucent. The lips are slightly chapped... _Stop, you fool._

He moves swiftly back towards the cockpit, leaving both Hux’s and his own emotional and physical issues behind him.

  
*

He’s brooding in the cockpit contemplating the future when there’s an angry over-ride bleep from the previously silenced communications console. It’s a high priority hail from the Finalizer, which is just coming into view. He had noticed it signalling when he came out of hyperspace, but as usual, he’s ignoring it. He’s never bothered to acknowledge or communicate with the ship when he arrives, leaving anything essential to the astromech. They know it’s his shuttle and his codes are valid. He’s obviously planning to land. What’s the point? The usual protocol bullshit shouldn’t apply to him. The doors open and out of the front viewport, he sees that there’s a small party assembled, awaiting his arrival. He rolls his eyes. Another unnecessary rigmarole he usually ignores. He retrieves his helmet, taking one last look through the bedroom door at his charge before he leaves the shuttle. Hux is mostly healed, his usually tightly controlled body lying relaxed and soft, facial expression almost childlike in it’s ernest innocence. They’ve known each other for years, grown into adulthood together, vying for Snoke’s attention, but have never truly looked at one other. He realises suddenly Hux has aged since they first met, lines beginning to form on his healing forehead and around his eyes, probably from years of sleep deprivation and accelerated by constant conflict and stress. Would Hux see the same things if their positions were reversed? Does his face look younger and softer in sleep? Hux’s expression is so unlike how it looks when he’s awake. He huffs. It won’t be like that for long he thinks.

Sliding his helmet onto his head, he strides out, passing the saluting assembly without acknowledgment. Whoever cleans the shuttle will find the precious General soon enough... He chuckles in his helmet at the thought of an overall-clad cleaner screaming at the sight, as the turbolift doors close. He stands idly, watching the panel lights flick through the levels. His thumb twitches in an attempt to get under his fingers...and he tightens his fist with a sigh.

  
*


End file.
